Asia Pacific Gardening

01/17/2025

You probably have seen these Alberta Spruce trees at garden centers, hardware stores, or even grocery stores, especially right after the Christmas holiday. Often times, these are on clearance and can be great material for a beginner bonsai.

In this video, Robert takes a common Alberta Spruce that you can find at these stores and transforms it into a beginner bonsai. Watch and learn!

Post holiday season, a lot of garden centers, hardware stores, and even grocery stores will often times have Alberta spruce trees on clearance. IN this video...

01/10/2025

You've probably seen this type of "bonsai" being sold at big box retailers. While the material itself can sometimes be good, the conditions it's surviving in needs some work. Take a look at this video on what needs to be upgraded and why. We want bonsai trees to be thriving, not just surviving!

If you currently have one of these trees and have not done the necessary upgrades, come visit us! We have the proper soil and thousands of containers for you to choose from.

We wanted to make this video because it's the time of the year where certain big box retailers try to capitalize on the bonsai hype. They do so by selling yo...

01/03/2025

It's that time of year where we get many new bonsai owners bringing in their dormant juniper because they think it's dying. It can definitely be tough to see if a juniper is dead or alive during its dormant phase, so we created this video to help.

This video is a little different because it's more like a guessing game. How many did you get correct? Let us know in the comments!

It's that time of the year where we get many people bringing in their tree asking for help because it looks dead. Knowing if your bonsai is dormant or not ca...

12/31/2024

We have a set date for our next Bonsai For Beginners class! We will be working with an outdoor Procumbens Nana Juniper tree. Please call us at (253) 335-1297 to register as space is limited.

Class structure:
The first hour we will be going over principal care for the bonsai. We will cover temperature, lighting, watering, pruning, styling, and repotting. All the essentials to ensure that your bonsai will thrive!

The second hour we will be planting the juniper into a ceramic bonsai pot. The newly planted bonsai will go home with you!

12/27/2024

Some of you may have received your first bonsai over the holiday, so we thought we'd make a video on some basic principals. A common bonsai gift is a juniper, and the information in this video pertains to the three basic principals to ensure your bonsai thrives. Watch and learn!

Many people who receive a bonsai as a gift over the holidays receive a juniper. We have seen horrible instructions on how to care for junipers (like keeping ...

12/20/2024

This week's video shows how you can transform a seemingly ordinary looking juniper into a beautiful forest bonsai. This is ONE tree! Take a look!

Junipers are one of the most common trees used as bonsai here in the pacific northwest. However, most beginners end up purchasing a nursery stock juniper and...

12/17/2024

Happy to be featured on PNW Bainbridge magazine's winter issue!

You can read the whole issue here and find us on page 11.

https://issuu.com/pnwbainbridgemag/docs/pnw_bainbridge_winter_2024_for_digital/0?fr=sMDdhZjgwNjA1MTA

12/13/2024

We often get asked how fast do bonsai trees grow. In this video, we try to answer this complex question and show some comparisons from what the tree looked like a year ago to now.

However, keep in mind, the art of bonsai isn't to grow a small tree to a larger tree; it's about training the structure of the tree and finding balance.

We often get asked how fast to bonsai trees grow. Often times, beginners want to purchase a small tree and grow into a large tree. Keep in mind, growing from...

12/06/2024

Uh oh. The cats found their way to the top of the greenhouse 😼

12/06/2024

Back to the basics for this week's video! This time, Robert was asked to repot this old Scotch pine that's been in a plastic pot for the entirety of its life. We help transition the tree into a proper bonsai by fitting it with a proper pot and working the root bound. We left the fine detail pruning for the customer, but we also go over a few steps. Watch and learn!

A customer collected this tree from a private bonsai enthusiast. From what we know, this tree has been in a plastic pot the entire time. As most of you know,...

11/28/2024

We are closed today for Thanksgiving, but will open regular hours Friday 11/29.

In the mean time, we decided to post our weekly videos today instead of Friday since post Thanksgiving may be a bit hectic. Enjoy!

Bonsai is often given as a gift over the holidays. In this video, Robert shares some things to consider when gifting a bonsai. Just because you spent more fo...

11/25/2024

Took some more regular juniper nursery stock and created an ocean side rock penjing. The details of the pumice rock was meticulously carved by hand to create texture. The arch was also carved by hand. There are drainage holes for each tree so any access water will flow thru like any bonsai.

11/22/2024

A quick cell phone pic of us transforming a flat looking juniper nursery stock. With some wires and angle planting, we turned one plain looking tree into a forest.

11/22/2024

Alberta Spruce trees are commonly used as Christmas trees during the holidays. Why just get one Christmas tree that you toss out at the end of the season when you can create a bonsai out of it to enjoy? Check out this spruce forest Robert put together!

Alberta Spruce trees are pretty common at garden centers, especially around this time of year. They are also what people use as Christmas trees for the holid...

11/15/2024

This week's video is a looooong one. We let the camera run to capture the entire maple pruning process for this tree, which has never been pruned for 30 years. We share quite a bit of tips and tricks throughout the video, so plenty to learn!

This particular maple has never been pruned and it's over 30 years old. While it may be a smaller maple tree than some of the others in our previous videos, ...

11/12/2024

Our next Bonsai For Beginners 2.0 class is this Saturday November 16th from 2pm-4pm! We still have a few spots left so it's not too late to register!

In this 2-hour class, you will learn the basic principals to care for your indoor bonsai. We cover lighting, temperature, water, soil, pruning, styling, and potting. You will then take what you learned and create your own bonsai that you get to take home!

To register, visit us at our store or call us at (253) 335-1297.

11/08/2024

Part two of the Lebanon Cedar bonsai is out! This one Robert covers detailed wiring to finish the design of this tree. Let us know what you think!

Robert finishes the Lebanon Cedar bonsai from the previous video. In part 2, we show some close ups of detailed wiring and hopefully we can share some of our...

11/01/2024

This week's video we go into detail about pruning a Lebanon Cedar nursery stock. This will be a two part video; part one is pruning and part two is wiring/potting. Next Friday we will post part two!

A customer purchased a Lebanon Cedar tree from a local nursery because he thought it had potential. He wanted to ask Robert how to style this and have Robert...